Saints and Angels
by WeLonelyOldSouls
Summary: Saint XIV lived a long life, full of surprising and mysterious events. Some of which he would write down, and some he would only recount quietly by the light of a dwindling fire. These are some of those anecdotes.


**AN: Continuing the series of the mystery guardian. This time with a new twist. I hope you enjoy!**

The first time he saw her, she was across the field from him, sowing seed. It wasn't glamourous, but something stuck out to him. He waved and she nodded and that was the end of it. It wasn't until he was serving dinner that night that he realized why she stuck out. _He didn't recognize her._ Saint knew everyone gathered in this little collection of tents, every face and name and step pattern. The more he focused, the more he realized how off she was. For one, not only did he not recognize her, no one else had either. He tried to be discreet about his inquiries, but subtly was not a strong suit of his, and soon the information spread all over the camp, _Saint ran into someone he doesn't know in camp._ No one has friends or relatives visiting, or anyone hiding in their tents. There's a search of the forest around them, but no tracks turn up. He considers that she's a risen like he is but dismisses it almost immediately. His ghost would have said something, wouldn't he? When nothing comes of it, Saint presses it from his mind and moves on. There's crop to harvest and people to protect, Risen to fight and fallen and- he has no time for distractions.

Four months later he sees her again, though he doesn't realize it. He's perched on a ridge overlooking a fallen camp. Prisoners are held in cages underneath their ship, which is partially grounded and smoking. The fallen that mill about are wearing red colors, meaning Devils. Saint hates Devils, ever since he found a set of dregs gnawing on bones. Small bones. Small human bones. Children's bones. Saint racks the slide of the rifle he's scoped through and narrows on one of the captains, who is gesturing with his swords at a group of vandals. His finger tightens on the trigger and he's almost squeezed off the shot when something rockets overhead. He looks up from his rifle to see a ketch breaking atmosphere, atmosphere boiling under its shields. He holds his fire as a cordon of skiffs break off from the ketch and make to land near the crashed Devils' ship.

Saint has never seen yellow colors on a fallen before. Never. He's seen red and purple, green and orange and white and black and grey, but never yellow. He's careful to observe what happens as the two groups meet. A pair of captains drop out of one of the floating skiffs, and they start barking in their language, gesturing and shouting. Saint guesses they're making demands of the crashed Devils. The Devil captain doesn't like the proposal and laughs at them. The yellow cloaks grow upset at this and they gesture to one of the skiffs. The lower portal glows for a moment as something is transmatted down. A purple floating orb of machinery and void power, with a glowing eye. _Servitor! _

The yellow cloaks look proud as the servitor flexes, all of the devil's backing away. All but the captain. He chuffs and waves his own hand. There's a loud grinding and the smoke pouring out of the ship doubles. He barks and a vandal runs up, reporting to him. He doesn't like the report, judging by the fact that he grabs the vandal's extra arms and rips them off, forcibly docking the creature in front of their guests. The new dreg screams and scuttles back, ether leaking from its wounds. The Devil Captain barks again and six dregs rush to start cutting the fallen skiff open with plasma cutters. They get a seam down the side of the ship and are starting on the next when the skiff wall glows bright red for a moment before explosively shooting off, catching two of the dregs and killing them as the spider tank climbs out of the skiff.

The Devil Captain sits smug, backed up by greater firepower than the yellow cloaks. They scowl and growl, but eventually cave and one of the skiffs lands. The crew of the skiff file out, and load into the other two, with great anger, the two yellow cloak captains climb back in their skiff and it start to pull off, away from the intimidation. Before it can drift more than a few meters, something massive crashes through the to of the skiff and continues through the rest of it, digging a crater int the rock when it lands. The metal peels off in chunks, delicate machinery exposed to the fallen scavengers and they take the bait. The devils' swarm the wreckage of the satellite, gleefully shouting. The disabled yellow skiff crash lands not far, and the captains from before swarming out of the trees with their party in tow. The two groups bristle as weapons are drawn, tensions climbing. All it would take is one shot to start a house war. Saint itches to take the shot, but his rifle is too distinctly human to be confused for fallen. It wouldn't work. But, something glints on the opposite ridge and he sights in. tucked away in a furrow in the cliffside, much like he is is another sniper. He can't see them, only the end of their rifle and scope. But, the weapon looks much like a fallen shock rifle, just modified somehow. He watches as the two groups of fallen posture and threaten, switching from the sniper to the fallen. Something sets off his sixth sense, and he swivels back to the sniper just in time to see the end of their barrel glow blue. The arc bolt launches out and he pans to see the two camps of fallen. From that distance, the bolt doesn't have enough strength to break through the shields, but the yellow captain stands in disbelief as it sizzles on his shields for a moment before dissipating. The silence holds for a single moment before combat launches.

The two houses go at it with everything they have. The yellow call for reinforcements, and skiffs are pouring in. But, the Devil's spider tank is more than a match for them and shreds everything they send. Saint watches as they wage war, dozens of fallen dying at the fight sparked by the mystery sniper. Slowly, as the hours march on, Saint slides along the ridgeline to the other furrow across the valley. He ducks under the stone overhang and crawls to the edge, dropping into the actual sniping hole. Leaning neatly against the wall is the rifle. It is as he suspected, a modified fallen shock rifle. Modified for human hands. Accessing the weapons logs, he records the last user. He doesn't recognize the name, but it is certainly not fallen. And with no sign of the mystery sniper, he shoulders the weapon. Waste not, want not. It isn't until he goes to crawl out that he notices the playing card taped to the overhang. A king of hearts, with a purple fringe drawn on its head. A familiar purple fringe. His fringe.

It's a while until he sees the mystery again, a long time. The remnants of humanity have started crawling together, started coming along in the shadow of the traveler. Saint is sitting in a meadow, just out of sight of the rough picket wall of whatever they could find thrown up between trees to keep the fallen out. It would take them no time at all to break through, but it is something. Saint closes his eyes and feels for the light humming above him. The traveler is massive, a shining supernova of power muted by its fight. A dormant sun, just waiting to be reignited. A branch cracks and saint's eyes fly open. He relaxes when he sees the person, _Just another guardian. _He goes back to meditating, and he assumes they do the same. Later he opens his eyes to find night has fallen and his mysterious visitor is gone. He thinks nothing of it until father pulls him aside and asks him, _so who was that woman sitting with you in the clearing?_ Saint realizes then that something is wrong. Father has always had a gift for feeling other's light. He knows every risen or iron lord, or as the new one's have started calling themselves, guardians. Father doesn't know them. But Saint felt their light, how could he not? They shone. Not like the traveler, radiating brilliance softly, devoutly. They shone like a lighthouse, focused and strong, but narrow. Powerful, but collected. Laserlike. Saint only felt it for a moment, but he would never forget the feeling of their light. It was like the traveler awoken, if only to shine on him.

_How does one's light get that strong, that focused? Saint knows of risen and iron lords who less radiate so much as shine. More directional. Some of the new lightbearers are so, the ones who come from hard places, who struggled and died and revived and fought tooth and nail for every scrap of power before they ever found a weapon. It was guessed that adversity taught one to focus their light, but if so, what had she faced to have winnowed her light to such an intensity? What could have possibly required such a focused power like that? How far into the darkness had she clawed her way out of? _

The next sight of her he almost missed. It was fleeting, just a simple moment in the midst of his proposal to Osiris that they venture past Mars. A single glimpse out of the corner of his eye- but enough to derail the conversation and they forgot all about exploring past mars for a while. Instead, Osiris advocate they push in, to Mercury.

He didn't see her, but he knew she was around the next time. Saint was exploring the Manhattan nuclear zone, probing the ruins within for anything useful to the city. Saint wasn't a spiritual man, not really. He did not believe in ghosts or phantoms. But he could tell he was not welcome in this place. This land was foreign to him, was alien. Gear went missing, slipped away. Cliffs crumbled and buildings shifted. The sky wept acidic rain or was overly bright and blinding. Saint struggled to force himself to continue, to push on, but he was ready to admit he was not wanted. But, there was a rumor from one of the hunters, that buried under the main plaza was a golden age weapons depot, still locked up. Saint knew the City needed arms, and that vault would do much good for the people.

Saint was ready to give it up when his gear started reappearing. He would go to sleep, and in the morning the missing parts would be neatly stacked by the entrance to his camp. Saint tried to catch them, set up cameras and mines and stayed awake, pretended to be asleep; he tried everything. But the mysterious helper was wily, and he never caught them. It was the last day he allotted to his search, and Saint was coming up dry. He had found the vault, but as the hunter said, it was locked up tight. Without the code, Saint was never getting in. Giving up, Saint was packing his gear away when someone tapped him on the shoulder. He whirled around, but no one was there. Not invisible or cloaked, not hiding or dimension walking. (Osiris new pupil was **scary. **She had walked out of a wall in front of Saint one day and simply told him not to question it. Saint wisely acquiesced.) Still, he searched everything, wasting his remaining moments in the MNZ. As he was loading up his final box into the small jumpship, his ghost noticed the note stuck to his shoulder plate.

It was flimsy, fluttering in the wind. Primitive, marked in resin and dyes. Ghost scanned it and informed him it was made of wood pulp of all things. Paper, he called it. A technology surpassed way before even the golden age. But, scrawled on the flimsy paper was a ninety-four-digit code. With great trepidation, Saint punched in the code to the vault keypad. The first time is buzzed negative, as it had every time before, but Saint tried again. This time he was more careful about which key his large armored fingers hit, and the light dinged green. With great groans and banging, the vault doors unlocked and slid open. Saint gazed at the rows and rows of guns and ammo, or grenades and rockets and vehicles. He wept openly, thanking his deliverer. This would save the city, he knew it. At that moment, he knew who his helper had been. It could only have been her, she who haunted his dreams and kept him awake wondering. His mystery guardian.


End file.
